5 Things to Talk About This Weekend

The new Star Wars trailer, the first lambchop in space, and more.

1. Star Wars: Episode VII teaser trailer dropsWhile you’re safe at home dodging those horrendous Black Friday weekend sales, J.J. Abrams has a little present for you: a hysterically anticipated first glimpse at The Force Awakens. There are only little snippets here, but the snippets look awesome—Stormtroopers without helmets, some kind of soccer-ball-riding R2 unit, a broadsword lightsaber, and the Millennium Falcon doing some sweet-ass loop-de-loops. Also, a girl (Daisy Ridley) who might be Leia and Han’s daughter? Let the frantic fan theorizing commence. [The Verge]

2. Chinese government bans punsChina’s State Administration for Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television has ordered the country’s media to “crack down on the irregular and inaccurate use of the Chinese language”—in other words, punning and wordplay. The implications for creativity (not to mention freedom of speech) in the world’s most populous nation are doubleplusungood. [The Guardian]

3. Lamb chop launched into space…Fortunately, the art of language-riffing is alive and well in the U.K. To promote his new book, Meatspace, novelist Nikesh Shukla decided to launch a lamb chop into the stratosphere. (Get it?) He strapped a hunk of lamb on a fork (prepared by swanky London Pakistani restaurant Tayyabs) and a GoPro camera to a weather balloon, and let it fly. The resulting footage—which was shot in June, but only just recovered after a farmer found the lost camera in his field—is pretty mind-blowing. Lucky little chop. [BBC]

4. Elevator of the future floats, moves sideways, is fancyAn elevator worthy of Willy Wonka and his psychologically manipulative ways is in development German company called ThyssenKrupp. The design reimagines the way elevators move, using a magnet-driven system to all elevators to move both vertically and horizontally, sans cables, in continuous loops. If it works, we could be looking at radical new ways of thinking about high-rise architecture. If it doesn’t, we’ll probably all end up being attacked by Gnoolies. [Gizmag]

5. Dutch actress traversing Antarctica on a tractorManon Ossevoort is the grand dame of long-distance tractor driving. She’s already piloted her Massey Ferguson on a four-year trip from Holland to South Africa. Now, she’s finishing her trip all the way to the literal ends of the earth, driving the rig 2,900 miles over the tundra to the South Pole. She’ll hit the bottom of the planet on December 7. [Smithsonian]